Stream here for forseeable futureInvest NI chief

The call centre - once one of the city’s biggest employers with a workforce of up to 1,000 - told Invest NI in late May it would “maintain a presence in Londonderry for the forseeable future.”

But the centre currently employs just 21 people at the Waterside site.

Invest NI’s International Investment boss Bill Montgomery wrote to the Trade Minister Arlene Foster to set the matter straight after the state agency was advised by Stream that 34 employees were to be laid off at its Spencer Road site “due to a global restructuring of the delivery of two significant blue-chip contracts.”

In an internal memo Mr Montgomery explained that contrary to media speculation Stream intended maintaining a presence in the city for the long term.

He advised Stream lnternational’s decision not to make a formal press statement was taken at senior management level in Amsterdam and that local management had not been able to influence this.

He wrote to the Minister on June 9 after receiving a letter from Foyle MLA Raymond McCartney expressing concern “regarding Stream International’s intention to close their operations in Spencer Road, Londonderry.”

“Contrary to media speculation, Stream International has informed Invest NI that they will continue to maintain a business function in Londonderry and will be renewing the lease for the upper floor of the Spencer Road site at the end of June 2011,” wrote Mr Montgomery.

“The remaining workforce will be circa 21 employees, and they will continue to service Stream International’s European Union operations in highly skilled specialized jobs; (IT Finance etc).

“As Stream International has decided not to release a formal statement to the media, the Minister or Invest NI have been unable to respond to the media speculation regarding Stream International’s operations,” he added.

Mr Montgomery explained how the call centre had gone from being one of the largest employers in Londonderry to its skeleton staff of today.

He told the Minister how Stream had established its Northern Ireland operation in the Ulster Science and Technology Park in 1996 with capacity for 650 seats.

“Unfortunately, employment levels declined sharply in 2003 due to a number of major clients ‘off-shoring’ contracts to India and other locations to save cost.

“However local senior management worked to secure new work for the Londonderry site and in 2009 the workforce numbered 820 people,” he wrote.

But “as the global economic downturn accelerated in 2009/2010 Stream International was not able to maintain this size of workforce and the company radically downsized towards the end of 2009 to circa 60 employees,” continued the investment chief.

From December 2009 to May 2011 the company maintained around 60 employees although several new contracts had to be won over this period in order to keep this up.

Eventually in May of this year there was the announcement of a further 34 redundancies, and by the start of last month the firm had a staff complement in the Waterside of just 21.